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iMac HD died. Get a brand new 14" MBP topped out?

I

iHavequestions

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Oct 23, 2011
279
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I just realized the fusion drive on my 2017 iMac died (4.2 GHz Intel Core i7 Quad-Core upgraded 64GB of DDR4 RAM, 27" Display, AMD Radeon Pro 580 Graphics Card (8GB).

The rest of the computer should be fine. Should I:
  • Buy a Thunderbolt 3 SSD to use a bootable disk (4TB would be comparable to what I have in the iMac costing roughly $800)
  • Buy a brand new 14 inch topped out MBP M1 and just use the iMac target display mode (I've been looking for an excuse to buy one and an excuse happened)
  • Both? Might be a shame only use the iMac as a screen when I could still make it work for less than $1000.
 
I have a 2013 iMac that had a 3TB fusion drive. When it bit the dust I had two SSD drives installed and at 8 years old it still runs like a champ. However, if you can afford the 14" just do it.
 
iHavequestions said:
I just realized the fusion drive on my 2017 iMac died (4.2 GHz Intel Core i7 Quad-Core upgraded 64GB of DDR4 RAM, 27" Display, AMD Radeon Pro 580 Graphics Card (8GB).

The rest of the computer should be fine. Should I:
  • Buy a Thunderbolt 3 SSD to use a bootable disk (4TB would be comparable to what I have in the iMac costing roughly $800)
  • Buy a brand new 14 inch topped out MBP M1 and just use the iMac target display mode (I've been looking for an excuse to buy one and an excuse happened)
  • Both? Might be a shame only use the iMac as a screen when I could still make it work for less than $1000.
Click to expand...
What do you use the computer for?
 
I had a 2017 iMac with a spinner drive. I used an external Samsung T5 as my bootdrive and it worked great. My wife is using a Samsung T7 external as her bootdrive with her 2019 iMac with a fushion drive. Highly recommend.
 
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I would look into something like the Samsung X5 for this iMac – seems to be a beast. Write speeds on that drive should bring it into the modern era.

At my last job, we had a maxed out 2011 27" iMac that got slow because of the HD. At the time, we bought a SATA to Thunderbolt dock and used a Samsung 850 EVO or whatever was out at the time. Worked really well! Wouldn't use that slow of a connection now, though.
 
iHavequestions said:
I just realized the fusion drive on my 2017 iMac died (4.2 GHz Intel Core i7 Quad-Core upgraded 64GB of DDR4 RAM, 27" Display, AMD Radeon Pro 580 Graphics Card (8GB).

The rest of the computer should be fine. Should I:
  • Buy a Thunderbolt 3 SSD to use a bootable disk (4TB would be comparable to what I have in the iMac costing roughly $800)
  • Buy a brand new 14 inch topped out MBP M1 and just use the iMac target display mode (I've been looking for an excuse to buy one and an excuse happened)
  • Both? Might be a shame only use the iMac as a screen when I could still make it work for less than $1000.
Click to expand...
There are Youtube videos on replacing the hard drive in you iMac. It really isn't hard. I had a 2TB Fusion Drive also and never liked it. I replaced it with a 2TB SSD. I also upgraded the RAM to 32GB. It's a 2015 model and even though I also have an M1 MBP13, I just love the 5K screen on the iMac. I still use it and it pretty fast for a 2015, especially with the upgraded specs that I added. Check out the YouTube videos on replacing the SSD....
 
iHavequestions said:
nah, too difficult. Thanks for that suggestion though.
Click to expand...
Replacing it isn't that bad imo but I am also a technician. For the average user it may be scary. Truly though if you just go slow with the screen on your first try the 2012-2019 iMacs are very upgradable. You can put up to a 2TB NVME SSD in the 2017 and any SATA HD/SSD you want as well. Sell your iMac to me if you want to get rid of it lol!
 
iHavequestions said:
I just realized the fusion drive on my 2017 iMac died (4.2 GHz Intel Core i7 Quad-Core upgraded 64GB of DDR4 RAM, 27" Display, AMD Radeon Pro 580 Graphics Card (8GB).

The rest of the computer should be fine. Should I:
  • Buy a Thunderbolt 3 SSD to use a bootable disk (4TB would be comparable to what I have in the iMac costing roughly $800)
  • Buy a brand new 14 inch topped out MBP M1 and just use the iMac target display mode (I've been looking for an excuse to buy one and an excuse happened)
  • Both? Might be a shame only use the iMac as a screen when I could still make it work for less than $1000.
Click to expand...
In Europe expensive gear like this iMac has a 5yr life expectancy, if it breaks down within the 5 years the manufacturer has to fix it FoC. I had a screen go 4yrs 8m after purchase, Apple replace the 27" screen.

Do you not have any consumer protection laws you can lean on in your country?
 
I used an external SSD with my iMac with broken HD and don't recommend. You'll notice a performance reduction doing tasks with lots of read/write. Now I use the external SSD to clone my MacBook. Every time I clone I boot from it to check if it's working and can tell the speed difference from the boot.
 
leoborges said:
I used an external SSD with my iMac with broken HD and don't recommend. You'll notice a performance reduction doing tasks with lots of read/write. Now I use the external SSD to clone my MacBook. Every time I clone I boot from it to check if it's working and can tell the speed difference from the boot.
Click to expand...
That seems to speak more about the external SSD itself than using an external SSD as a boot drive.

Coming from an internal spinner or a fushion, an external SSD is significantly faster. At minimum a Samsung T5 has 10x faster read/write speeds from just a standard spinner. It made an incredibly frustrating to use computer like it was a brand new machine.
 
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What leads you to believe the fusion drive has failed?
What symptoms do you get when you try to boot?

If you think the fusion drive failed, try booting to INTERNET recovery:
Command-OPTION-R
This is NOT THE SAME as "the recovery partition".

Open disk utility and check things out.
IMPORTANT: go to the view menu and choose "show all devices" (to see them all, of course).

If you think the fusion drive has failed, there is a good chance that only "part of it" has failed -- generally the platter-based hard drive. The other component is a 128gb SSD that may still be ok hardware-wise.

DON'T WASTE $800 on a thunderbolt drive.
You MIGHT consider buying a Samsung X5, perhaps 1tb in size, but be aware that these can run "on the hot side".

I would suggest buying an "nvme" blade SSD and a USB3.1 gen2 enclosure.
This won't be as fast as a thunderbolt3 drive, BUT... it will still be pretty fast.
More for your money.
 
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ForkHandles said:
In Europe expensive gear like this iMac has a 5yr life expectancy, if it breaks down within the 5 years the manufacturer has to fix it FoC. I had a screen go 4yrs 8m after purchase, Apple replace the 27" screen.

Do you not have any consumer protection laws you can lean on in your country?
Click to expand...
What country is this? EU regulation only requires 2 years of limited seller's liability... I am not aware of any statutory manufacturer's warranty, let alone for 5 years...
 
Check max speed of your USB/Thunderbolt port. Some SSDs may exceed that speed, thus wasting the extra money (I paid extra for a 2000MB/s drive that never exceeds 1000MB/s in my MacBook).

Also, keep in mind that even a 550MB/s SSD is going to smoke your Fusion drive. I have one booting up a 2015 iMac and it made all the difference. Once you go SSD, that slight delay when an old hard drive spins up becomes maddeningly annoying and unacceptable.

A 1TB boot drive (1050MB/s) and a 2TB secondary drive (550MB/s) could cost under $400. And both drives will still be useful in a future setup.
 
It’s a 2017, so it’s thunderbolt 3. I believe that you can find a TB3 nvme case. If so, do that and get an NVME drive. It will be so much faster than what you’re used to. Here’s one for example (no experience with this one, just an example)
www.sabrent.com

Thunderbolt 3 to M.2 NVMe SSD Tool-Free Enclosure

FALSE
www.sabrent.com www.sabrent.com

And yeah, if leoborges has an external ssd that’s slower than a spinning internal hard drive, something is quite wrong. Either connected by USB 2, or something wrong with the drive. Even the slowest SATA ssd should beat the internal hard drive, and NVME’s are in a different speed class entirely.
 
Fishrrman said:
If you think the fusion drive has failed, there is a good chance that only "part of it" has failed -- generally the platter-based hard drive. The other component is a 128gb SSD that may still be ok hardware-wise.
Click to expand...
In my case, it was the SSD that died. The platter drive was fine as far as I could tell, but the SSD was like 95% worn out according to DriveDx and another utility I used.

The SSD gets absolutely hammered with read/write cycles in a Fusion Drive, because lots of data is constantly being moved on or off of them based on what's being actively used. Apple's miserly SSD sizes don't help at all.
 
Last edited:
iHavequestions said:
Welp, that's one variable out of the way.
Click to expand...
Someone on another thread was recommending that Luna display adapter thing that lets you use another Mac as a display. I'm not sure what the latency is like, but it could be worth checking out. Doesn't let you use the iMac's webcam or speakers, apparently, but still.
 
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